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33 1/3 SERIES BOOK #58 - Richard and Linda Thompson's Shoot Out the Lights

Are Liner Notes Not Enough For You?

33 1/3 is a series of short books about the making of wide variety of albums, written by a diverse group of authors/artists with titles ranging from Aja by Steely Dan to Zeppelin IV. The series contains over fifty titles and is acclaimed and loved by fans, musicians and scholars alike. These are for the music nuts out there who appreciate fantastic design, and smart, fun writing. Each book in the series takes an important album and breaks it down in startling minutiae. We love these books…you will, too!

In the fall of 1980 Richard and Linda Thompson (of Fairport Convention fame) had recently been dumped from their record label and were on the verge of divorce. Somehow they overcame these miserable circumstances and managed to make an album considered by many to be a masterpiece.

Shoot Out The Lights puts the album—from the personal history driving the songs, to the recording difficulties they encountered and the subsequent fall-out—in context. This is a brilliant, emotional book about a brilliant, emotional album.

About the Author:
Hayden Childs is a researcher and policy expert for the Texas Legislature. He's also an aspiring novelist, an occasional essayist and a hardcore Richard Thompson fanatic. He contributed to the book Lost in the Grooves and is co-editor of the online music magazine The High Hat.